Issue 20
Fatigue, the sex lives of seahorses, Wiener Werkstätte, and Jacqueline Marval
Welcome to The Unreliable Newsletter, my digital collection of curiosities and thoughts. I find that my interests do not fit any one particular subject and I hoard knowledge around history, fine arts, literature, music, social issues, and pop culture - there is nothing I enjoy more than sharing it with anyone who will listen. It is important to a reader of my newsletter to know the context in which I live; I have a chronic illness- which deeply impacts the way that I approach the world. I will often discuss it within my posts, and it is also what makes this newsletter so unreliable. A number of my readers bookmark my posts and continually return to it over and over period of time - I think that is an excellent way to approach it. Thank you for allowing me to contribute to your day.
something I have been thinking about
My brain fog and fatigue have been pretty intense the last couple of months, though not as bad as it has been in the past. Reading literature has been a bit of a challenge, but I have been collecting some really fun content to share and I thought it would be a good time to send them out before this newsletter gets too long. So no book updates this time around, but some other enjoyable and interesting things to consume.
Happy autumn everyone!
Love,
Naomi
something short to read/watch/listen to
I love Emma Straub’s post about giving trophies to friends and families for getting through life along with large and small successes.
Kate Casey is a podcaster who covers all things unscripted. She recently did an interview with Victor Williams, retired Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) agent and anti-human trafficking advocate, about the Sean Combs raid, indictment, and investigation around human trafficking. Williams also touches upon the importance of educating kids around online safety. Human trafficking has been a topic I have followed for the past twenty years - from undergrad, through my graduate program in Criminal Justice, and in my work with domestic violence victims.
This is a good place to plug an organization that I have been a long time supporter of - Businesses Ending Slavery and Trafficking (BEST). “BEST provides training for front line employees in hospitality, aviation, maritime, transportation, and a variety of industries. We also support organizations to implement BEST practices and to communicate publicly about their social impact” - for labor trafficking and sex trafficking. I have been sending them $10 a month for the past decade - I get a lot of appreciation.
The Infamous podcast series on the fall of the power couple, Chris and Tory Burch is very entertaining - even if the story telling style is a bit cringe. Especially, in part 3 when the Delaware judge on their case epically calls it a “drunken WASP fest” and states the he’s “been deep in … autumnal Cheever phase” and went on to recommend that the attorneys go see the Edward Albee play Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and watch Mad Men, during a scheduling hearing. Judge Strine is apparently famously inappropriate and seems to have a vendetta against preppy clothing - during a case involving J. Crew he stated “What’s a duck shoe? You see all these freaks wearing this really ugly — I like L.L. Bean, but those duck shoes are ugly, I mean there’s no way around it.”
My current obsession is the instagram account @adventuresinjelly - makes me want to make some old fashioned jello molds - the colors are just fantastic and the wobble is so satisfying!
If you happen to be looking for some shockingly scandalous domestic drama of the seahorse sort - you will very much enjoy this essay by Richard Smith, The Strange Romance of Seahorses.
I just binged Special Ops: Lioness on Prime, it is also on Paramount Plus. Really well done and the cast was excellent. It’s created and written by Taylor Sheridan (Yellowstone- it seems anything he touches these days is gold), with Zoe Saldana and Nicole Kidman. Morgan Freeman and Jennifer Ehle also appear.
something from an archive
Recently I returned to the Wiener Werkstätte archive at the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK) in Vienna, which I dove into last December. I am still pretty obsessed with this design collective and did some Fall “window shopping.” I came across these three fantastic styles and thought I would share.
The first image was taken by Atelier d'Ora in 1921 of a piece by Anny Schröder; the second image was taken by Franz Löwy of the model Lisa Mukarovsky; and the third image is by Atelier d'Ora in 1922 of a jacket by Eduard Josef Wimmer-Wisgrill.
Eduard Josef Wimmer-Wisgrill also created these fantastic broaches below
some visual enrichment
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I love The Knitters!
As always a well-written and thoughtful read for the mind and...for fhe eyes!